those decisions based on that. >> i was interviewed pregnant for one of the jobs i had, i was hired. an employer can make that decision, but what if i came in and wasn't showing and i disclosed it or i was pregnant and didn't disclose it an employer will ask me. liz: what about that? >> my point is smart employers look at you according to the skill set you have to offer in that particular position. it shouldn't have to do with whether or not you're pregnant but let's be realistic, those family decisions of individual staff people do have implications. are you saying that if they're out there they should be overturned and left to the employer? >> it is a very sensitive issue but they should be

overlooked -- they should have another look. but now with the cause. >> final word mercedes. >> if the employer makes use signed the petition they are skirting the law and violating the law it is problematic. liz: am sorry for if i was a little tricky at the end. tomorrow we hae ronald reagan and formerncncncis is up next. david: we'll see you tomorrow. >> i'm melissa francis and here's what's "money" tonight. reducing the deficit through immigration reform. how did it work? president obama held meetings today with top ceos and labor leaders. we have all the latest details. plus the justice department body slammed standard & poor's alleging it defrauded investors over mortgage securities rating. is s&p cooked? john eagan, ceo of eagan jones rating

company joins us exclusively to react. the entire electronic industry could be turned upside down. foxconn workers in china will get the first free union vote. these guys produced 40% of the world's electronics. will this push up the price of your smartphone? you might want to embrace for impact. even when they say it's not it is always about money melissa: first let's take a look at today's market moments. stocks recovered after the worst day of the year. solid u.s. and european economic data helped put the bulls back on the track. the dow briefly climbed back above the 14,000 mark and pared session highs closing up 99 points. nasdaq and s&p 500 each gained more than 1%. starting off tonight with president obama's big

plan. using immigration reform to achieve a quote, balanced deficit reduction which the president says i i crucial for economic growth and competitiveness. he met with top ceos and labor leaders today. live from the white house with the very latest is fox business's peter barnes. peter, what happened? >> well, hey, melissa. that meeting just broke up a few minutes ago, the one with the ceos the president meeting with a dozen of them including lloyd blankfein of goldman sachs, mike car kent of coca-cola. marisa meyer of yahoo!. at the steakout the ceos came out and emerged with a unified them which is they all suprt comprehensive immigration reform that not only takes care of the legal immigration problem but also of the 11 million undocumented illegal aliens in the country, finding some pathway to citizenship for them. arne sorenson, the ceo of marriott said the ceos were

not monolithic on this issue. we also heard from the ceo of deloitte on the meeting. take a listen. >> it was more an education, a discussion and i was actually pretty happy to see business at the table being able to engage in important policy issues. there was no pressure or direction in terms of what positions to take or not take. >> and that's important because there are some competing visions out here. you have the president pushing for his plan but republicans up on capitol hill and some democrats want to make sure that before there's any kind of major amnesty program or registration with some probation period on the pathway to citizenship, there's a lot more border security and enforcement of existing immigration laws. melissa? back to you. melissa: peter barnes, thanks so much for that report. now turning to our "money" power panel to weighn on how the president's economic agenda would be affected by immigration reform, with me

is christian dorsey, economic policy institute and mercedes slap for former spokesperson for president george w. bush and steve camerota, center for immigration studies. what do you think about this idea that immigration reform would help reduce the deficit. do you buy that? >> you know, ieally don't. not under president obama and his sort of spend habits. but what i do think is goi to happen when you look at congress, they're going to view this immigration reform package and figure out a way, they will need to figure out a way to make it as revenue neutral as possible or reduce deficits. there will be a cost associated with implementing any form of this immigration reform. in 2006 we saw the cbo came out saying that the plan that president bush had proposed was going to basically raise e deficit $18 billion. but again, there will be questions that need to be hammered out with the deils of an immigration reform package. melissa: christian, it is so hard to quantify what this really means. if you make more immigrants

legal, that is more stress on the system. they will use more social services but it is also a higher tax base. how do you think it net as it nets out? >> i think it is positive in terms of economic growth. i would not look at this as a deficit reduction package for those that --. melissa: why do you think he says that? do you think he needs that to say he is sell it? that is how he is selling it. >> today is packaged what it will and will not do with respect to the deficit. with immigration reform whether or not it is necessary to do in order to see america can realize its full labor market potential. that is really the most important thing. attaching it to a specific number of deficit reduction in my opinion is not instructive or helpful. melissa: yeah. steven, what about that, overall do you think it grows the economy? you look at it from pure economic perspective if you have a larger labor force and consumer base that is larger economy? >> no question the presence of illegals makes the

economy bigger and lowers the gdp when you count them in makes overall average much less because illegals are overwhelmingly unskilled. we think a majority haven't graduated high school. melissa: how does that change if you legalize them? >> that probably doesn't change the big concern what most research shows if you legalize them, they don't pay that much in taxes because it reflects their educational attainment, low income people with not a lot of education don't pay that much in taxes but tend to use a fair amount of services even when they're paid on the books. so my research, heritage a others shows there is significant fiscal cost to legalizing them though the illegal immigrants could do better, that might be justification. if you're worried about a deficit it is definitely a bad deal for taxpayers. melissa: do you buy those economics? >> there is no real consensus what's going to happen in terms of in passing this immigration rear form plan but what we do know when you have the children of these immigrants, for example, that are being educated in the american system and they're able to

graduate from high school and they're able to become contributors to our society i think that is huge benefit for america. and what we do know is that if you are able to put in place, for example, a temporary guest worker program, effective one less bureaucratic one, less expensive one that actually companies can use, a lot of these individual will be coming in, working when they need to work seasonally and go back. it works in canada. they established it in australia. this is effective program we could use in order to make sure businesses --. melissa: christian, you think it is a bonus for the economy. how come? what do you disagree with that you heard so far. >> certainly i do believe once you bring people out of the shadows and you make them full participants in the labor market they receive the wages that are prevailing that they deserve. those wages are spent in the economy. that increases economic growth. you see them pursue paths to make greater and greater income, try to become more and more entrepreneural. this will be a net benefit for us overall i don't think there is any question about

that otherwise we wouldn't really be talking about it. the stickiest widget yet to be decided what do we do with the issues of guest workers mercedes talked about. that is the critical dividing line between democrats and republicans right now. melissa: another huge issue, steven i was confused about, you had president obama inviting labor unions to talk about this. labor unions are trying to play both sides. seems like they're not representing their members best interests because bringing more cheap labor into the country and making them legal, seems like people it is most threatening to are current union members. at the same time they clearly want these folks to come in and be legal because it would beef up the union rolls which are shrinking right now? >> right. it didn't happen in '86 when we have our last amnesty. didn't increase unionization. the hope this time it will. if you want to represent the interest of american workers obviously encouraging 7 or 8 million illegal immigrants

here to go home would be best. unemployment is 15, 20% among the young and less educated who compete will legals. but union leadership is hoping for new members but it also sees itself as part of a coalition politics with progressives. so in a way they're putting sort of coalition politics first hoping for progressive social policy but, their own workers kind of are not their top priority here in that sense. melissa: interesting choice because it cuts both ways. mercedes, when you look at the stat, hispanic union members jump 20 1% over past 10 years, white workers pell 12%. seems where their interests lie. >> tradeoff in the labor unions. on one hand they want to make sure the immigrants o get a pathway to citizenship. they view them as making the sales pitch to late teens noise. at the same time they will have to accept the temporary guest worker program that the president is silent on in a while. he didn't even mention it in his nevada speech.

they true it as a tradeoff as in terms of getting more hispanics as union members. melissa: we'll leave it there. you guys were fantastic. i hope you come back. >> sure. melissa: the justice department accuses standard & poor's of defrauding investors over subprime mortgage ratings but will the government crackdown stop there? sean eagan, from eagan jones joins us exclusively to react. more "money" coming back. officemax is celebrating our new collaboration with go daddy! with an online package including: domain name, website builder with five pages and basic email just $49.99! that's up to 76 percent below online providers and only at officemax stores!

♪ . melissa: so another huge story today. the justice department filed a lawsuit against the credit ratings company standard & poor's, for up to five billion. it accuses s&p of knowingly inflating ratings that helped trigger the financial crisis in 2008. it sound like the government thinks it might have a smoking gun. listen to what tony west, the acting u.s. associate attorney general said today. >> s&p documents make clear that the company would regularly tweak or bend, delay updating or otherwise adjust its ratings models to suit the company's business needs. melissa: wow, thas rough. experts and analysts

questioning the real motivation behind the lawsuit. also why it has taken so long for the government to act. joining us on the phone in a fox business exclusive is saug eagan. he runs eagan jones rating company. he has been in his own dogfight with the government. >> welcome back to the show, sean. >> thank you melissa. melissa: what is your reaction to this? a lot of people are asking why s&p as opposed to moody's and fitch as well? is there politic moat vision -- motivation behind this because the s&p has been critical of the government's own ratings. >> this has been a long time coming. this by the way is not just the u.s. government. about 15 states are also involved in this statute and a number of people have been asking why the, why there hasn't been an action taken to date about a primary cause of the 2007-2008 credit crisis whereby

according to several commissions the inflated ratings were identified as a principle cause of the credit collapse. melissa: does that mean you think others will follow? do you think the other guys are just as guilty and we'll hear about it and what about yourself? >> i don't know whether there will be others. certainly from s&p's perspective they will say, they issued the same ratings as their two major competitors so why should they be singled out? i think it is a function what sort of investigations are underway at the other two firms. melissa: do you think they're looking at your ratings? >> we've already been through the whole process. we settled with the sec last month. the issue with us was not, didn't concern any of our ratings. it was rather a 2008 application whereby it was deemed, i think it was, and

it is public so you can check, that we didn't publish properly and that our application was, was misleading. melissa: so, do you think the reason why they're looking at s&p as opposed to others has to do with something, has to do with the e-mail a lot of people have been talking about today from an analyst, calling him analyst d? he made up a song, to burning down the house, the lyrics talking about the subprime market and the real estate market in general, which really is the kind of thing that, you know we heard about from analysts when the tech bubble burst? that shows that internally they thought one thing but externally they were sort of publishing another? do you think that make as critical difference here for s&p? >> i don't know. the, what the government has to prove is that, the rating firm knew that the ratings had issued were false and, some comments that have been released have concerned the e-mails, for example, it could be structured by cows

and we would still rate it. from s&p's perspective, what was really meant by the e-mail is that no matter what we're going to rating is. from the government's pertech -- perspective, it could be a garbage transaction and they would still give it a high rating. this is going to be, if it goes to trial it will be a landmark case. so it's fascinating to a number of industry observers. melissa: all right. sean, thanks for coming on. >> thank you. melissa: adam shapiro has been following this story for years. >> seems like years, doesn't it? melissa: it is. the whole financial crisis, first of all what is your reaction to what sean said? >> i think sean is on target. here is the key in page two of the government's complaint. s&p knowingly with intent to defraud, devised participated in and executed a scheme to defraud investors. that is pretty simple in. that is fraud. that there are 124 pages they outlinet.

s&p says, slow down a second. for instance the e-mail sean brought up, there are several e-mails, the structured cows or the famous e-mail which is video where he sings to burning down the house talking about how crappie these subprime mortgages cdos, collateralized debt obligations they were selling. some of the quotes from s&p responding to all this. first they said with regards to all of this, the doj has filed a meritless civil lawsuit against s&p. they say it goes on to say. at all times our ratings reflected our current best judgments. unfortunately s&p like everyone else did not predict the speed and severity of the credit crisis and how credit quality would be affected. they quoted government officials who said it would be contained. they're quoting ben bernanke who said july 2007, don't worry about subprime. melissa: the lyrics to burning down the house contradict that. >> here is what they say about that. the e-mails cherry picked by

doj are contradict taken out of context and conflict with other evidence and don't reflect our culture or integrity and how we do business. before you make a decision on this thing, one of the things the government is pointing out, structured finance was so crucial to the s&p, to the rating firm's profits they point out, 95, $106 million. this is profit. 182 million in '07. they were willing to work the other way to maintain the business of the banks. melissa: do you believe that? >> do i believe it? melissa: yeah. >> do i think s&p, i think the government is doing right thing going after the ratings firms. i'm not --. melissa: do you think, -- >> look, they have to have goods on the others. this is all from the whistle-blower hotline. listen an s&p lawyer was on the, on one of our competitors pointing out that they believe this is absolutely retribution for the downgrade u.s. credit. melissa: of course that is what they will say. adam shapiro thanks for coming on. one of the most powerful men on wall street knocks on the white house's door asks for

a job but instead he gets kicked to the curb. charlie gasparino has an, exclusive who got the cold shoulder. you're never going to believe this. that's next. plus, air cancer hides away fiscal masks to will the make life work makeover prove a flop for voters? former reagan economic advisor art laffer give us his take. do you ever have too much money? ♪ .

♪ . jo so apparently doesn't matter if you're a top fund-raiser for president obama, if you work in the private equity business you're probably blacklisted from a top administration post. just ask blackstone president hamilton entony james. charlie gasparino has the exclusive details on this huge fund-raiser.

>> you know him well, i'm assuming? melissa: well, from around. >> interesting guy. worked at various jobs around wall street. went to work for steve schwarzman at. been a huge fund-raiser. this is perfect example why, this administration sort of equates tobacco or cigarettes with private equity. melissa: great analogy. >> like mitt romney worked for private equity. private equity took companies private. some of them worked, some of them didn't but sort of a bad industry. as you know it is not. many private equity companies create jobs. there are some cases where they don't but it is pretty good. tony james from what we understand has quietly reached out to the administration since the re-election in november to try to get a job at, in the administration, some sort of senior post, presumably economic post and he has been given the cold should. the cold should. he is essentially been told,

not now or maybe not never. kind of interesting. what does this mean for james? well, as you know he is largely considered the heir apparent to steve schwarzman, ceo of blackstone, the big private equity firm. however a lot of people now say that is not the case. this guy jonathan gray, who is the head of real estate is really the, is really the heir apparent. we should point out schwartzman is 65. i was talking to somebody in there, said he is not leaving unless in a wooden box. that was a quote from a senior blackstone official to me today. i think that is pretty true. he is not going until he is sick or he has to. he is, you know, alzheimer's god forbid or something that forces him it leave the firm. by the way, there are ceos that worked well into their 60s, even into that ir70s. ace greenberg as a perfect example. melissa: oh, sure. >> that said, hamilton tony james is just a couple years younger than schwartzman. of course he is not really the heir apparent to this

guy jonathan gray. we should point out we talked to blackstone about this they declined any comment. wouldn't comment on any of this stuff. i can tell you sources on wall street both close to the administration and close to blackstone. melissa: you know what you're talking about for sure. what i think is really interesting about the story it echoes a lot of stories we heard after the first obama election. people went out on a limb, raised a lot of money thinking they would get some sort of post afterwards. afterwards were given the cold should. >> if you think about it, jack lew, i'm sure nice enough fellow. loyal democrat understands the ways of washington but is the best guy to be treasury secretary? obviously not. this is not a major player in economic circles. at a time when we needsort of real economic intelligence, here's guy that is you know, a very deep player in that context. you know. worked two years at citigroup in some sort of --. melissa: doesn't know enough about wall street and

business? >> doesn't know enough about economic. >> somebody like tony james would make a lot of sense? >> i think so. melissa: or jamie dimon. >> jamie doesn't want the job. i think someone like larry fink wants that job. he is good understands nexus between washington and wall street. understands the economy and understands the money game which is is a treasury cretary needs to do, not quite a private equity firm. melissa: yeah. >> so i think that is problem with this administration. look at some of their appointments they have been pretty lame. hagel, jack lew. mary jo white is smart but is the right person, a prosecutor to run a regulatory agency? probably not. >> great story, great scoop. charlie gasparino breaking the story. thanks so much. coming up on "money", who needs the math? eric cantor make as warm fuzzy sign to win over the gop will this win over voters? former reagan economic advisor art lfer joins us.

"piles o money" coming up. ♪ this is america.

we don't let frequent heartburn come between us and what we love. so if you're one of them people who gets heartburn and then treats day afr day... block the acid with prilosec otc and don't get heartburn in the first place! [ male announcer ] e pill eachmorning. 24 hours. zero heartbur >> we'll advance proposals aimed at producing results in areas like education, health care, innovation and job growth. our solutions will be based on the conservative

principles of self-reliance, faith in the individual, trust in family, and accountability in government. melissa: hmmm. that was house majority leader eric cantor what was being touted as ament swror address today but really, that was the best he could do in outlining a new strategy for the republican party? he thinks the gop needs to move beyond their strect focus on cost-cutting measures and start paying attention to more issues that really matter to the average taxpayer. call it a new generation of the compassionate conservatism. the only question is will rebranding work? joining me with more is art laffer, former economic advisor to president reagan. great to see you again. >> thanks, melissa. melissa: there were a lot of people a little disappointed with this speech today. it was supposed to be like a big blowout. we'll really get people in the tent with this one! we'll be compassionate. everyone will feel great. it was just, i don't know. am i missing, was there something in there that we all missed? >> the only thing i would

say a little fancy of a speech to be honest with you. it was extremely well-written and well-done like it would be for a presidential address which seems a little inappropriate here but what he said was really great. by the way --. melissa: it was? >> i thought so. melissa: what do you hear? what do you like? what was new? >> we would go for a low rate flat tax. i thought he was talking about choice in schools, pushing all of these things. it wasn't the negative cut of cutting spending going back on that way which has been the confrontational stuff. i thought it was the right way to go. i would like to see that pushed. i thought the speech was very fancy however. melissa: yeah. >> i think, i think cantor is really wonderful. general he has been one of the real leaders in the republican house and i'm quite impressed by him. >> has the same problem i think a lot of republicans have with they're having difficulty connecting with people and convincing them that why the math is important. >> that's a problem. melissa: this is huge problem in our country right now.

it is impossible to convince a majority of people obviously that you've got to look at the math and really do the numbers. for example, if you ignore the math, you believe things like, if you like your health care you can keep it. anyone who could do math knew that was a lie. >> also, melissa, if i may say, it was too formal of a speech. if he made it simple, if you tax people who work and pay people who don't work you will get a lot more people not working. that type of phrase, making it sort of common speech i think is a much better thing to bring people into the fray and formal --. melissa: does that sound like you're attacking unemployed people? >> i don't think so at all. the way kennedy put it was really brilliant,. the best form of welfare is high-paying job. you can't become prosperous on handouts. that is not the way it happens. i think that what eric was trying to say in his speech. he should have made it very colloquial and he didn't. it was very formal. melissa: is there anyone out there ing that the way you said? >> sure.

eric does it all the time in person. he is great on it. this was just a very formal speech that they built up to be a big thing the i remember one time when mike pence did one and asked me to read his speech ahead of time. it was so formal, so austere, so big. they're very good at communicating with people, melissa and they really understand the economics really well. this speech i thought was over the heads of a lot of people. but it hit all the rut buttons. melissa:. you're saying don't work the math out for folks. that is boring. that isn't, i mean, even -- >> everyone wants the math worked out. melissa: to communicate the message without using any numbers. >> you work out the math but some of the things, you don't want to be a government accountant. that is not the math. that is where they make all the mistakes. budgetary accounting is nonsense the whole point of economics, melissa is to change people's behavior. you can't move 20 billion here and 5 billion there that type of stuff. that's silly. i was head the chief economist of the omb when it

was formed and that stuff never works. how does it affect an individual person? when you have a low rate flat tax. if you had total tax of 12% of the your income, that is all you had to pay. that's it. melissa: that was number. you use ad number. making me calculate 12% of my income. >> that is better than what you have to pay now. melissa: hey, i love it. i love doing that. i'm wondering why we have to count on all of america not being able to do math? >> no, you don't. do not ever underestimate americans. you have to go clearly with the numbers and make it clear. you don't have to be ross perot. you remember that with the ears. melissa: i'm not going anywhere on that. you're on your own with that ears thing. >> the only politician shorter than i am. you don't want to do a blackboard with a stick. you do want to do a 12% tax. well make it to have to pay all the lawyers, counselors, income specsists. you don't have to hire a

congressman or senator to get a good deal. all you earn from the first dollar to the last dollar that is easy. it is wonderful math. melissa: you're terrific, art. >> melissa, you're terrific. melissa: next on money, a big push to the biggest makers of electronics. a vote by foxconn workers in china could have a huge implications for cost of your favorite gadget. you want to hear this one. at the end day it is all about money and numbers, darn it ♪ . officemax is celebrating our new collaboration with go daddy! with an online package including: domain name, website builder with five pages and basic email just $49.99! that's up to 76 percent below online proders and only at officemax stores!

[ female announcer ] some people like to pretend a flood could never happen to them. and that their homeowners insurance protects them. [ thunder crashes ] it doesn't. stop pretending. only flood insurance covers floods. ♪ visit floodsmart.gov/pretend to learn your risk. [indistinct conversations] man: looking for these? you drive buzzed, it could be one very expensive ride. first you got to make bail. then pay me to get your car back. your insurance premiums will go through the roof.

and my legal fees just keep adding up. all told, it could end up costing you $10,000. [siren in distance] announcer: buzzed, busted, and broke. because buzzed driving is drunk driving. ♪ . melissa: so looming unionization vote on the other side of the world could have a big effect on the prices you pay for some of your favorite electronic gizmos. from smartphones to tablets to big-screen tvs. foxconn, the much maligned chinese manufacturer of i pads and iphones and other consumer electronics is letting their employees elect their own union leaders for the first time, a move that could make the next iphone you buy a lot more expensive, not to mention have a profound effect on manufacturing here at home. joining me for more is gordon chang, the author of, the coming collapse of china. let's start with foxconn itself and what is really

like. you hear horrific stories about the working conditions there. you've been to china. you talked to workers. what is it really like? >> it is very regimented. foxconn runs the most regmented factories on earth. melissa: what does that mean? >> you have six hours wiout a break. 12-hour shifts. you have students being forced to work in these factories. they closed their schools so that terry gow, the owner of foxconn, can get more cheap labor. the problem here --. melissa: live in the bizarre dorms where they're packed into really small rooms, right. >> 8 to 10. we talked to a number about workers who could get free housing from foxconn but they wanted to live on their own outside where they would have to pay for it because they are cockroach infected. they're too crowded. all the rest of it. melissa: yeah. now we're hearing they may be able to unionize but is that really the case? >> well, they will be able to elect their own representatives to unions but these unions are under the thumb of the all china federation of trade unions which is a state

instrumentalty which has been used by the communist party to keep workers under control, not represent them. and terry gow is lking to the communist party and the union to keep workers in line because the real story here is these workers, the first thing they will do, they will not bargain over wages. yes of course they want more money. they will bargain owe working conditions because the system is so regmented people can't stand the system. melissa: yeah. it is sort of amazing to me companies here in the u.s. who are so worried about their image, you know, they seem so progressive and liberal in their policies, companies like apple, then go and byproducts from a place where it seems like, and you know better than i, from all these reports people are really working in subhuman conditions. >> basically, you had all the suicides three years ago. melissa: yeah. >> there were about 25 of them at one plant. the one we went to. that's why foxconn is going to automate. in 2011 they had 10,000 rob boats. ne year they will have a million robots in china

because people don't want to do this work. really the problem here is, you have a system which although it is extremely efficient, turns out products really, really ft, which is important for apple but on no the less it is unsustainable because chinese workers will not put up with it. melissa: how do the robots change the equation then? how does it change how many workers are involved? somebody still has to build the robots. what does it mean to the cost of products here in the u.s.? >> the cost of products will definitely go up. that seems to me to be pretty clear. in december apple announced that it was bringing back one of its product lines into the u.s. which everyone said was the imac. part of the problem is because in china you have got now the worker militancy. you have a number of other problems with chinese manufacturing. low-end manufacturing has started to leave china but also --. melissa: where is it going. >> bangladesh, vietnam, indonesia. all of wal-mart's house brand are made in bangladesh where 10 years ago they were all made in china. and it is not just low end. lenovo, the chinese laptop manufacturer, is bringing

production to north carolina. so you know, clearly what we've got is a situation where chinese manufacturing is becomi unsustainable. melissa: let's talk about the logical extension of this. you're saying prices go up although if they can move it to bangladesh why are prices going up? >> it takes a lot. terry gow moved fox conn from taiwan when wages got to high. he will move it again. it will take him a lot to move it outside. >> if they're not the low cost manufacturing base anymore, are they also the go-to go guy for u.s. debt? how does that relationship change? >> what will happen we'll buy a lot less products from china. clearly our relationship is going to degrade to a little bit because just manufacturers will not find china to be hospital it pitable as it has in the past. wage rates and supply workers which is really most important thing. number of workers in china has been declining. been that way since 2010. environmental rules. melissa: why is the population declining or workers?

>> worker population. population trend. they started to decline in 2010, six years before china's official demographers said it would. this is really very important. this gives workers a lot of bargaining power. which means that foxconn plants, they will slow down production, because they know they have more power than they did five years ago. melissa: gordon, great insight. thanks for coming on. >> thank you. melissa: here is our "money" question of the day. do you think unionization of foxconn would lead to higher prices for smartphones and tablets? pretty much all of you agreed with that one. we want to hear from more of you. like us on facebook.com slash melissafrancisfox or follow me on twitter at melissa f francis. time for the fuel gauge report. a gas leak caused a explosion at pemex headquarters office. accumulation of gas in the basement sparked the blast. it ends speculation it may have been an act of sabotage. 37 people are confirmed dead from the explosion. oil futures bounced back

from the biggest fall in a month. crude settled at $96.64 a barrel. heating oil futures climb on tightening oil supplies. they settled at a 16-week high. next on "money". it seemed like a good idea at the time. one of the super bowl's biggest place is a dream come true for a furniture store as customers. a longshot bet by the owner sparked a free furniture give away. you can never have too many recliners. ♪ .

♪ melissa: we are rocking out. s&s the camera came on, adam did not want to do it. time for some "spare change." we're joined by adam shapiro and monica crowley. first up, this might come as a shock when the report shows traffic congestion cost american drivers $121 billion in gas and lost time. if you break it down, you and manneed to spend lost productiv. d.c. spin average of 67 hours sitting in traffic in 2011.

so far from the 32 gallons per gas sted, it came out to about $1400 per person per year. what you think? >> i can tell you. environmentalists will not be happy, but building roads is not a bad thing. expanding the highways and building more would not be a bad thing. when you do the mathematics to spend money on high-speed rail and green energy transportation products? it is cheaper to build more roads. >> people will not give up their cars. consumers rejected, they want to be in their car. this is one of the great scandals of the stimulus that we

have pumped into this economy, so much of it was designed to be targeted toward infrastructure, roads and bridges to alleviate this stuff and it didn't happen. the original stimulus, only 6% spent. melissa: they don't even count on me sitting on my horn in traffic. i try not to buy m when my kidsn the car, but you have to keep it tight, cool, it is so frustrating. >> that section out of the traffic in d.c. is horrendous. people who experience it, they kind of get used to it. the radio going, hands-free cellular phone. melissa: i grew up in the valley, that is terrible. i am allergic to living more than 15 minutes from work. it scarred me for life.

anybody familiar with babies and kids crying on an airplane while you are stuck in your seat, air asia is trying to solve this problem. the airlines want a kids free quiet zone one slic unselect fl. the so-called quiet zone has softer lighting, sectioned off. the seat seat can cost $35 extr, will this solve the problem? >> i think it is a great solution. amtrak does have a quiet car. melissa: is it kids free or don't use your electronics? >> you can bring a child, but if the child acts up, you get pushed back. melissa: if a kid is crying on the plane, the whole plane hears it. 7 feet, everybody can heart. >> it is different from being next to the baby or being 10, 20

rows away. >> i think they're charging for this. it works out to about $10, $30 extra but like in the old days the smoking sectn of an airplane. it will come to the forward part anyway. melissa: nobody in more plain than a parent who would do anything to make the child stopped crying. >> and everybody tries to give you advice. melissa: want high flight attendant said can i get you a drink, would you like a double? yes, i would, thank you. moving on, good game and tough loss for the 49ers, but jell-o was hoping to save the day. their solution is putting. they're sending thousands of pudding cups to san francisco today. you can see what locations will have them available. i saw this yesterday and i thought this was genius marketing. don't worry, tuesday we are

coming. everybody is doing something for the ravens. >> you know what the 49ers fans really need though, jell-o shots. >> even some butterscotch pudding would help. jose cuervo will be doing that nexthisnext year for whatever ta loses. melissa: i love it. perfect. a furniture store in maryland hhd a promotion last week if the ravens returned either game kickoff for a touchdown, they would get their furniture for free. as luck would have it, they're all winners because the linebacker jones returned a kickoff for the touchdown in the third quarter. 109 yards and then said it was only 108 yards. can you imagine if you were running the furniture store and watching this? are you kidding